Thursday, August 26, 2010

Stacy


Stacy would like not to be an outsider girl, but because of her OG best friend Melanie, Stacy has been dragged in(see OGW, 12/3/09, 1/4/10).  Right now, she’s trying to write a letter to Melanie, who has finally been sent, against her will, to rehab.

Stacy:  “Whuh-ut!”  I roll my eyes as I shut the lid on my laptop.  I feel like growling, so I do.  “Grrrr,” but my little sister doesn’t hear that, or she doesn’t care, more likely.  She knocks on my bedroom door again, and can’t see when my fingers curl into manicured claws that I want to use to scratch someone’s eyes out – hers, Melanie’s, my own, I don’t care.  Fucking Melanie.  Fucking Heather.  Fuck me.
     My sister knocks again, boldly, unashamedly, without fear – which makes me even madder.  Now my claws dig into my palms, making half-moon circles as my hands become fists.
     “I said, what!” I say.
     At this, my sister Heather, six years old and oblivious, walks into my room.  It won’t do me any good to yell at her now, she’s already here.  I sigh, a sigh-growl – huuuh (yoga breath in), huuurrgh (and out).
     “Whatcha’ writing?  Is it a poem?  Is it about me?  Want me to write you a poem?”
     I was writing a letter.  I don’t want to – oh fuck it, let her see it!  I open my laptop, which whirrs to life, and my letter to Melanie appears –
     Dear Melanie,
I am hurt that you would ask me to
     “I can even write a song!” Heather continues.  “Here it goes, ‘My sister Stacy is a witch,/ My sister Stacy has eyes that twitch,/ Stacy, oh Stacy, is so mean,/ She always makes me feel inbetween—“
     “That doesn’t even make sense, you little freak!”  I grab Heather around her little kid belly and pull up her tee shirt, saying, “I’ve got skin!  I’ve got skin!”  Squiggling my fingers on her belly, which is her biggest tickle spot, I crack her up. 
     “NO!” (gasp gasp giggle), “I’M NOT DONE!” (gasp, giggle giggle choke, giggle).  She squirms away.  She gets to my bed, climbs up on top and throws her arms to the side, not just singing, but bellowing, “My sister Stacy grabs my skin,/ Makes me laugh, ain’t that a sin,/ She’s all mad that I can sing,/ And she can’t and her friend Melanie went to rehab,/ Which doesn’t rhyme/ Ain’t it a crime –“
     Heather jumps back as I leap from my chair to the bed.  I grab her by the sneaker and pull her toward me.  She’s giggling, and starts singing that Amy Winehouse song which it’s just crazy for a six year old to know and it makes me want to cry, only I laugh as I pull her all the way to me and she’s singing in a fake low voice, “They try to make me go to rehab and I say—“
     “And I say/ No!  No!  No!”  We sing together, and then I tickle Heather on the belly again, and she gets me in my tickle spot under the chin, and we crack up and the computer goes back to sleep before I could write to Melanie that I don’t think it’s a good idea for me to sneak her some blotter acid in rehab because then she’ll never come home.
     “Do you wanna play with me now?” Heather says.
     “We are playing,” I say, tickling her tummy again and then we’re laughing so hard, we fall off the bed.
My mother’s all, “Cut that crap out, I’m trying to watch my show!” from downstairs, which is bullcrap anyway, she’s probably on the computer googling herself as usual and doing lines no doubt and Heather and I don’t stop, we just roll around and tickle and laugh, and I never do get to finish that letter or even smoke the joint in my desk drawer like I was gonna.

Thursday, August 12, 2010

Eva


Eva:  New outsider girl Eva walks with a limp, has a lazy eye, has an unfortunate haircut… well, read on and you’ll see.

Eva:
I had a dream
I met my twin.
We wore the same earrings:
Scalloped mother-of-pearl.
We met in my doctor’s office.
“Take a book, leave a book”
Says a sign on a basket.
There is a water cooler
At one end of the room
A mirror you walk by
To get to it
That I never look in.
I hate my doctor’s office.
Soon I will have to undress,
And I worry what she will think.
I smiled at my twin, shy.
“Your hair looks like mine,”
She said with a sneer.
I noticed her hair was some
Shade of brown-blonde,
My shade of brown-blonde,
Attempting to be a cute bob.
Unsuccessful.
“Your breasts are kinda small,
I noticed,” I said, as I
I got a small, paper cone
Of water, limped with it
Back to my seat,
Sipped,
And stared.
“You walk funny,”
Said my twin.
“You talk funny,”
I said, feeling meaner,
“Your nose is bent,”
“Your forehead is too high”
“Your zits are gross,”
“You have a lazy eye.”
We scowled,
We pouted,
We stared,
We glared,
And finally,
We cried.